


Aerith, Tifa, Yuffie and the Stain of 'Purity'

by TwoCatsTailoring



Series: Meta Collection [5]
Category: Final Fantasy VII
Genre: Fanwork Research & Reference Guides, Gen, Meta Essay, Nonfiction, Sexual Content, Sexuality, character essay, rape mention, sexual development, sexual expirences
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-30
Updated: 2018-11-30
Packaged: 2019-09-02 18:35:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,912
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16792453
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TwoCatsTailoring/pseuds/TwoCatsTailoring
Summary: Opinion essay on the pitfalls of demanding sexual and moral purity from FFVII's female characters when the world they are existing in contains numerous references both overt and subtle that such a thing would be extremely unlikely.*Unedited from it's original form. Spelling errors included at no extra charge. :D





	Aerith, Tifa, Yuffie and the Stain of 'Purity'

**Author's Note:**

> Archived from twocatstailoring tumblr.

There was a post going around earlier in the week about Aerith and what a delight she is. I agree with that post 100%, and it really got me to thinking about the much-maligned ladies of our band of heroes in Final Fantasy VII. 

Now, I've written some pretty female-centric fanfic for FF7 in the past and I still love and adore Yuffie with an ardor that is pretty ridiculous. But while I have been on the outside edges of the vat and rolling ship debates with the other two women, I’ve never really cared enough to think much about either of them (outside of a little bit about Tifa. Aerith I never think about at all because I came to the franchise knowing that she got the dead early in the game.)

Short version of this post is this: At the time of the original game, I can’t see any of these three women (yes, three) as being completely devoid of any sexual experiences. I come to these individual conclusions based on what I understand to be each woman’s lifestyle reality from childhood on.

I’ll address Yuffie first, as she is my favorite. At the time of the OG, she is 16 years old. Yes, I understand that in both my own country as well as many others, this is considered to be a minor, therefore making it unlawful for her to consent to or to be engaged in any sexual activities or practices. And i’m not saying that she did, mind you. But let’s look at facts.

Her father is the ruler of Wutai, but what is Wutai? When she is a young kid still, Wutai lost the war with ShinRa, reducing it to nothing more than a tourist trap. There was no reactor, they were the losing side of a war that they fought bravely in, and if it operated anything like real wars, the the victors go the spoils: Wutai’s culture, most likely old, vast, rich, and central to their way of life, was stripped. Who knows what all ShinRa helped themselves to in terms of the riches of Wutai - both money as well as cultural artifacts and art. 

Being the only child of the leadership, she was probably told stories as a very young child, of the glories of Wutai, how they would nobly fight for their freedom agaisnt all who would come. Tales all children hear, but for Yuffie they were part of her grooming, her leadership training, bringing her up to some day lead Wutai herself. 

Then all of that was stripped away, leaving her father a broken man and her country a shadow of itself. Once proud, now scraping and pandering to tourists to stay on it’s feet. I understand her anger, her drive to strike out on her own as soon as she could and travel. Collecting materia - because think of the money you can get off a mastered All! - to bring back the glory of her home!

When we meet her in OG, first time we can being just outside of Junon before you even enter Junon for the first time. Think about where that is. Two and a half continents away from Wutai. She’s been traveling for a while by that point and she is alone. She is 16 years old, capable of kicking ass, she’s stealing materia along the way, and she is alone. She never makes any mention of friends or family or a group she’s been traveling with, so it is fairly safe to assume that she is alone for that trip.

Ballsy. And educational, I’m sure. If she did not have some knowledge of sex before she left Wutai (and that’s so up in the air, I can make a case either way) she certainly would have. She is a thief and her success depends on going undetected. I’m certain that she’s seen and heard a great deal of detail about the lives of the people she’s lifted things from - everything from what someone is getting for their birthday to some of the bending limits of the human body. 

And I’ll just state, for the record, that if I am going to make off with someone’s materia that they have worked long and hard to get and level up, I’m going to go about that when they are completely distracted and are not currently wearing their materia!

So maybe she had tried out some of what she’d seen. Maybe not (probably not I’d wager, tho she might have studied the subject a bit. After all, driven girl. Can’t get distracted when there’s materia to get!) But she would know the mechanics, and more importantly, the lead-up! Because really big heists don’t go without planning and consideration. And if you know that someone is going out looking for love, it would behoove you to watch carefully what they are doing so that your timing can be at the top of it’s game.

Next I’ll talk about Tifa. She is the one who becomes so very oversexualized in fanart and fics and all because of her breasts and short skirt. But let’s look a little deeper here. By the time we meet her properly in OG, she is an adult running a successful bar in a busy section of Sector 7. On a main street with other shops and homes, she owns and runs this establishment that serves both the members of AVALANCHE and the general public and she is dedicated to her business. This is evidenced by the way she seems to follow the customers out when Barret starts shooting the place up to clear it for the AVALANCHE meeting. I read her actions as apologetic, especially after she explains away Barret’s anger to Cloud a little later on.

But she's running a bar in a slum. In a slum that is in the underbelly of one of the largest, dirtiest, and most populated cities ever. Midgar is owned and run by ShinRa, one of the most corrupt and uncaring companies ever to exist. As we can see from the conditions in the slums, it is dirty, dangerous, and the people who live there range from moderately successful to the dregs of the earth. It can’t be a neat, tidy life with security and certainty at every turn.

And Tifa, we presume, has been living in this place on her own since she was 16 years old. There is no indication that Zangan stayed with her once she was mended after Nibelheim. If he didn’t that would mean she’s been fending for herself in this place for that long. 

I can't imagine, with the Wall Market being so close by and just the general living conditions that we see in OG in the slums, that there much that stays a secret long. Her mother gone, her father protective, I can easily believe that Tifa came to Midgar completely uneducated about a lot of things - from how to haggle prices, how to find a place to live, how to not trust everyone you meet, and yes, even about how sex works.

Because let’s not forget that she only figured out she liked Cloud more than a friend *after* he left. It’s my guess that in the short time from Cloud’s departure to the burning of Nibelheim, she didn’t do a lot of dating (she was working and studying with Zangan and presumably going to school as well.) I could be wrong about that, but the timeframe is very small. Smaller even than the backwater that is Nibelheim. And let’s just be real for a minute. Backwater small towns are not widely known for being open and free with information regarding procreation.

But I think that living packed in with other people in the slums of Midgar, her education about things carnal was swift. Perhaps even personal, if curiosity set in and as she made friends with AVALANCHE and Barret’s crowd. But I can’t imagine that she would go uninformed or even inexperienced well into adulthood. And I can’t believe that even her romantic heart would cling desperately to the hope that ‘someday’ Cloud would return. 

(In fact, I think that it would be that very reality of life in the slums that would help her move past that 'someday,’ only to have Cloud’s reappearance out of seemingly thin air one day throw her for one hell of an emotional loop. But I digress….)

Then there is Aerith. Test subject from the time she was a month old to the time she was about five years old, who knows what all manner of tests she was subject to? Who knows what she witnessed her biological mother go through in the labs before they escaped. Then her mother dies right in front of her (perhaps as a direct result of injuries or weakness from whatever tests were done) and she goes to live with Elmyra in a pretty little house in the only sunny spot in the slums. 

While home was neat and tidy and clean, outside certainly wasn’t with Turks, starvation, illness, dripping mako, stagnant air, and monsters that roamed the streets of Sector 5. This was Aerith’s home and she was comfortable with it, not lost or thinking it odd or weird. She lived, even thrived very much like the flowers she tended in the stripped horrors of the slums. 

I’d call her relationship with Zack pretty normal for that age, and who can say what they did or did not get up to? But, the fact remains that he died and she was left alone with Elmyra and she was getting older. She hits upon the idea of selling flowers early in life, I’m sure, so that is what she does. But she is savvy, street-smart, and wiser than Tifa who only came to this near the edge of adulthood. Aerith’s been in the slums and this life from a younger age and I think would take a lot more of what she saw, heard, and understood - remember she doesn’t bat a lash at the Honeybee’s and seem to talk to them as if she knows them individually? She is definitely knowledgeable about Don Corneo’s habits and plans, so there is no way that anyone is going to make me believe that Aerith Gainsborough doesn't have her share of practical sexual knowledge.

[THERE IS EVEN A VERY WELL CONSIDERED THEORY](http://fyeahcontroversialcharacters.tumblr.com/post/48405280202/defense-of-aeris-final-fantasy-this-post-was) that Aerith herself was a prostitute and frankly, I buy that hook, line, and sinker. She is confident, shrewd, and takes exactly no shit while doing just as she pleases, and I think that those traits, as well as her OG knowledge, mesh up well with that as a career choice she might have made. 

Now, the nitty-gritty of this that I’ve saved for last so as to only mention it once is this: Any one of those three women at any point in their stories could have become targets for abuse, assault, or even rape. None of their lives was clean, tidy, or protected in their worlds. Yuffie was tiny, young, and alone. Tifa was successful, attractive, and kind. Aerith was funny, witty, and took no shit. No, none of them would deserve it, none of them would ask for it, but as we all know well enough, people have been violated for less. Even as capable as all three were at defending themselves, it could potentially be a reality for them and must not be overlooked.


End file.
